The Poetical Works of George MacDonald
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- I
- stood before my childhood's home, Outside its belt of trees;
All round my glances flit and roam
O'er well-known hills and leas;
When sudden rushed across the plain
A host of hurrying waves,
Loosed by some witchery of the brain
From far, dream-hidden caves.
And up the hill they clomb and came,
A wild, fast-flowing sea:
Careless I looked as on a game;
No terror woke in me.
For, just the belting trees within,
I saw my father wait;
And should the waves the summit win,
There was the open gate!
With him beside, all doubt was dumb;
There let the waters foam!
No mightiest flood would dare to come
And drown his holy home!
Two days passed by. With restless toss,
The red flood brake its doors;
Prostrate I lay, and looked across
To the eternal shores.
The world was fair, and hope was high;
My friends had all been true;
Life burned in me, and Death and I
Would have a hard ado.
Sudden came back the dream so good,
My trouble to abate:
At his own door my Father stood--
I just without the gate!
"Thou know'st what is, and what appears,"
I said; "mine eyes to thine
Are windows; thou hear'st with thine ears,
But also hear'st with mine:"
"Thou knowest my weak soul's dismay,
How trembles my life's node;
Thou art the potter, I am the clay--
'Tis thine to bear the load."